


Mirrorball

by flawlessassholes



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Amsterdam, Book of Nile, F/M, Getting Together, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Older Man/Younger Woman, Rimming
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-07
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-13 16:50:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29904132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flawlessassholes/pseuds/flawlessassholes
Summary: He can smell her from here, and she smells awful, the perfume of pot, liquor, sweat and sex that he always associates with Amsterdam at night. Her camisole is slipping off her shoulders and it’s clear she isn’t wearing a bra. Booker feels like a dirty old man.“I’m going through my— wha— Nicky called it—"“The terrible twos,” they say in unison. Nile blinks and then smiles.“So you’re familiar.”
Relationships: Booker | Sebastien le Livre/Nile Freeman
Comments: 27
Kudos: 65





	Mirrorball

**Author's Note:**

> This fic does have a brief reference to a 'bad trip' where Nile may have taken drugs laced with something, so take caution there.

Booker pushes the door of his flat open and hears the familiar chain reaction of wood meeting bottle and bottle beginning to roll. 

Which is odd. Booker hasn’t had a drink in about twenty years. 

Reflexively his hand goes to the Glock holstered under his arm. The door was locked, but in this life that means nothing. 

He flicks the light on, and there, sitting on the floor, her head lolling against the seat of the couch, is Nile Freeman. 

The bottle —the one the door caused to roll— stops at her boot. She picks it up, staring at its emptiness, then visibly remembers that she has a flask in her left hand. 

It’s a familiar sight, just as the rolling bottle is a familiar sound, but Booker isn’t accustomed to being the one standing. Or sober. 

“Uh,” he says. “ _Bonsoir_?” 

Nile blinks at him, her eyes bloodshot and bleary. “I thought you’d have liquor.” Her eyes close. “Why don’t you have any liquor?” 

“I don’t think you need any more,” he says.

“Oh, don’t you… kettle my pot…”

“I think you’ve lost your idiom.” Booker closes the door behind him and toes off his boots while Nile takes a long drag from the flask. He can smell her from here, and she smells awful, the perfume of pot, liquor, sweat and sex that he always associates with Amsterdam at night. Her camisole is slipping off her shoulders and it’s clear she isn’t wearing a bra. Booker feels like a dirty old man. 

“I’m going through my— wha— Nicky called it—“ 

“The terrible twos,” they say in unison. Nile blinks and then smiles. 

“So you’re familiar.” 

Booker was very familiar. They all went through it. Andy coined the term for their second decade of immortality, when they realize that it’s actually real, they’re not aging, they can heal from the impossible, and they go buck wild. Andy says she spent her terrible twos fucking her way through the Fertile Crescent. Joe and Nicky spent theirs together, lost in each other in Constantinople, though they say they did participate in some memorable orgies.

Booker doesn’t really remember his. He does recall he pissed his pants a lot, though. 

“Do you need a place to stay tonight?” Booker asks. Then, after a moment, “are the others nearby?” 

“No,” Nile says. “They’re in, fucking, uh.” She goes blank for a second and then sits up. “Odessa!” 

“So why are you here?” Booker asks. “We’re a long way from Ukraine.” He takes off his jacket and unholsters his Glock. He doesn’t miss the way Nile’s eyes follow his movements.

“Well, I thought that getting high off my ass in a kink club in Amsterdam would be a lot more fun.” 

Booker tries not to swallow his own tongue. “... was it?” 

Nile doesn’t answer, just unsteadily rises to her feet and slinks over to him. “You and me, Booker. It’s gonna be you and me.” 

“I don’t understand,” he says. 

“The others, they’re so fucking mature. So settled, so—“ She makes a disgusted, wounded noise. “So _in love_.” 

Booker knows. God, he _knows._

“But you and me, we’re fucked up,” Nile continues. She’s getting closer. 

Booker feels extremely tired. “I’m not—“ 

“We’re on the outside. You’re in exile, and I’m fucking— going through immortal puberty. I’m fucked up, and it’s so _obvious_ I’m fucked up. And it’s so— they’re so understanding, you know?” She wrinkles her nose, her voice affecting a distinctly Joe-esque tone. “Oh, take all the time you need, be safe, have fun, we’re always here for you.” 

It had grated on Booker, too, back then. He came back to their safehouses blitzed out of his mind on whatever cheap liquor he could find, covered in his own vomit and piss. Joe and Nicky and Andy, they were empathetic. They cleaned him, cared for him, nursed his hangovers and let him go out and do it again the next night. It was so kind and _so_ infuriating. 

She’s right underneath him now. Andy must have taught her how to do this, how to slink up into someone’s space, to go unnoticed using her words and her breasts and the flutter of her eyelashes. 

Andy didn’t have this effect on him, though.

“But I don’t want that,” she says, and he can smell her breath now, the alcohol and God knows what else. 

It’s a stupid fucking question, but Booker asks, “what do you want?”

She’s staring at his lips, her hands on his chest, her nails biting into the white linen of his shirt. Summer in Amsterdam can be brutal, but the air conditioning is thrumming now, making the flat uncomfortably cold. Her nipples are hard and pressing against his chest. 

“You know what I want,” Nile says, and when Booker doesn’t respond and _doesn’t look down,_ she says, “I want someone to tell me I’m _bad._ ” 

Motherfucking _Jesus_ cocksucking _Christ_.

“Nile, _mon amie_ ,” Booker says, staring straight ahead and not down, anywhere but down. “Perhaps we sleep this off, yes?” 

“The royal _we_ ,” Nile murmurs. “I could think of something else _we_ could do.” 

“I’ll take the couch,” Booker says, his eyes still firmly trained on the blank, modernist wall of the flat. “You take my bed.” 

“Oh, I’ll take your bed all right—“ 

“Nile,” Booker snaps, his tone sharper than he intends. “ _No_.” 

She steps away then, and Booker looks down, though his eyes are still carefully trained on hers. There’s some clarity coming back into her eyes, a more focused expression. She doesn’t say anything, just turns on one heel and stalks off toward the bathroom.

Booker sits heavily on the couch. He turns on the television, just to have some noise in the background so he can ignore the sound of the pipes in his flat groaning as the shower turns on. Why would she come here? Was this her first time in Amsterdam? Had she really gone to a kink club? And what the fuck had she meant, when she said _you and me_?

He needed to stop thinking about her, or thinking about her in his shower. He was disgusting. He tried to refocus on the television and wished that Nile hadn’t taken her flask with her.

He must’ve fallen asleep eventually because he wakes mid-morning with a crick in his neck and a headache like he has a hangover, not Nile. 

_Nile._

He gets up and opens the door to the bedroom. The bed is made as if it had never been touched. There’s no evidence of Nile anywhere in the flat; there’s not even a towel in the hamper in the bathroom. It’s like she was an apparition sent to cloud his judgment. 

He returns to the couch and falls back into an uneasy sleep. 

—

Seven months pass and he’s still in Amsterdam when the door of his bedroom opens in the middle of the night. 

In an instant, Booker has the knife from his bedside table in hand and he throws it towards the door. 

He hears a soft swear, and in the moonlight he can see Nile pull the knife from the wall.

“Your aim is off,” Nile says. “Don’t tell me you've gotten rusty over the past two decades.”

Booker doesn’t respond because part of his brain is still clinging to the last vestiges of his dream, the one that Nile so rudely interrupted.

He dreamt he was in Paris in 1926, the first time he saw Josephine Baker dance. He had been entranced that night, consumed by Miss Baker’s talent and presence, choking on his tongue as the city screamed for her, sensationalized her, objectified her. 

His admiration was always softer, quiet, reverent.

There, in the moonlight, memory and the moment collided, and Booker was consumed once more.

Booker rubs a hand over his face, trying to wrestle the dream away and regain consciousness. When he opens his eyes, spots of light dance in his vision and Nile is seated on the edge of the mattress, her back bent as she unties her shoes.

“Nile,” Booker says, his voice sleep-rough and from disuse in general— he doesn’t speak to many people these days.

Nile stands and shucks off her jeans, kicking them to the ground. 

Booker closes his eyes and lets his head thunk against the headboard. “Nile—” he tries again, but she’s climbing into the bed, keeping her distance, her back turned away from him as she curls into a ball.

His hand hovers over her shoulder where her skin is barely covered by a black mesh shirt. She still smells like smoke and liquor, but like the smoke and liquor of his youth— Absinthe and hand-rolled tobacco, zesty and warm and bitter and familiar. He pulls his hand back and watches her breathing even out. Her hair is braided into a thousand small braids, and they splay across his pillows like they always should. 

He watches her, her skin alive in the pale moonlight, reflecting the navy of the sky, highlighted in silver like she’s the moon. 

He doesn’t think he falls asleep, but he wakes in the morning, and she’s not there. 

—

He actually sees her out later that night. 

He’s been collecting intel for an organization combatting sex trafficking, keeping an eye out for Eastern European women forced to work in the brothels. He’s had an eye on one establishment in the Red Light District that is keeping passports locked away, and he’s watching from across the canal, leaning over the railing and flicking ashes from his cigarette into the murky waters. 

He’s worried about Hana, his informant, who loves working the windows but trades information to protect her sisters-in-arms who may have been forced into the work. He’s afraid she’s been made, and he’s keeping an eye on her as her shift ends. 

She closes up her window and smiles at Booker. He drops his cigarette, crushing the smoldering ember with his boot, and when he looks up, she’s at his side. 

“Good night?” He asks, and she nods. 

“I’m going out with friends, though, so I won’t need your escort home.” 

“I’ll walk you to the bar,” he says and holds out his arm for Hana to take. 

She smiles. “You’re so chivalrous, Sébastien. Maybe you’ll stay for a drink tonight?” 

He won’t because he knows what Hana wants and what she deserves, and he can’t give her either. “No, no,” he says. Hana doesn’t look disappointed, thank God, her kind smile remaining on her face as they walk in companionable silence. 

“This is me,” she says when they arrive at a bar with so many Heineken neon signs that it’s turning the sidewalk green. “Thank you again.” 

“You’re off tomorrow?” He confirms, and she nods, kisses his cheek and pulls the door to the bar open, loud, pulsing music spilling out onto the sidewalk before the door closes, and Booker’s alone once more. 

He’s still in De Wallen. The flat he’s renting is in Jordaan, so he begins walking west. It’s barely two a.m., and Amsterdam is still alight with tourists and locals fluttering in and out of bars and clubs. He thinks about stopping in one, just to have a beer —one beer, what could it hurt?— before he shakes off the thought. There’s a loud group blocking the sidewalk, spilling into the bike lane, talking loudly in English. 

_Americans,_ he thinks grimly. 

“Excuse me,” he says, but they don’t seem to notice. He sighs and tries again a little louder. “Excuse me.” 

“Yo, just go around, bro,” one of the men says, and Booker tries not to roll his eyes so hard they fall out of his skull. 

“You’re blocking traffic,” he says. “You and your friends will get mowed down by cyclists if you don’t move.” 

“Yo, why don’t you just _go around?_ ” The infant says, and he squares up, and Booker has to restrain himself from laughing at the man’s posturing. 

“Oh my God, Chris, just chill—” a familiar voice says, and from inside the cluster of tourists emerges Nile. “Oh,” she says. “Hey.” 

Booker is taken aback by how good she looks. She always looks good, of course, but so far, he’s only seen the aftermath of her nights out. Now, seeing her in the moment, he’s taken aback by how stunning she looks. _Breathtaking,_ he thinks, because that’s what he is— breathless. 

She’s wearing a silver dress that must be made of diamonds, the way it reflects the light. Her heels look tall and dangerous and deadly like she could kill a man with them and not think twice. Her braids are piled into a loose bun on the top of her head, the smaller braids coming free and falling along her face. Her eyes are a mirror of silver and kohl, and her lips are lacquered with gloss. 

Booker can’t believe he thought she only _looked_ like the moon last night when clearly she is the celestial body incarnate. 

“You know this guy?” The infant says. Nile hasn’t stopped looking at him, and she smiles. 

“Yeah,” she says. She turns, and Booker chokes. The back of her dress— there— there _isn’t_ a back of her dress, just thin straps holding loose fabric below the small of her back. Her shoulder blades look as sharp as knives, and her skin is a smooth expanse, like a vast sea that Booker wants to drown himself in. “I’m going with him; catch y’all later.” 

Booker’s pleased that she’s leaving this group of children and going somewhere— anywhere— with him, but the more rational of his two heads is disgusted by his pleasure— by the way he’s lusting over her. _I’m disgusting,_ he thinks. _A dirty old man. She should be with people her own age._

She’s not their age, he reminds himself. She’s old enough to be their mother. But she’s not _his_ age, either. 

Nile steps around the group with ease and he follows her. She seems to know where she’s going, and they’re still headed west, vaguely in the direction of his flat, so— he follows. 

“Where are we going?” He asks, finally, as he falls into stride with her. She’s almost as tall as him in those heels, and Booker tries not to think about the warm spike of heat that causes in his abdomen. 

“I want fries,” Nile says. “There’s nothing better than greasy fries and mayonnaise after a night out. Especially in Amsterdam.” 

“And how many nights out have you had in Amsterdam?” Booker asks before he can think better of it. _How many times have you been in this city and I haven’t known?_

She side-eyes him. “Do you really want to know?” 

Yes. No. 

Booker doesn’t answer, and Nile steps up to a walk-up Frites counter. She eyes Booker, then says to the bored-looking teen at the counter. “ _Twee, met mayonaise, alstublieft,_ ” she says. 

“Your Dutch is good,” Booker says. 

Nile wrinkles her nose. “Not as good as my Italian or French. Joe’s working on Arabic with me. I learned the basics in Afghanistan, but I’m still incredibly illiterate.” 

Booker didn’t hear much after _French_. “ _Qui t’enseigne le français?_ ” 

“Nicky.” 

Booker frowns. “ _Mais il parle avec un accent.”_

“Well,” Nile side-eyes him again. “ _Le locuteur natif n’est pas là_.” 

He knows. He’s not a great teacher, either, but at least he doesn’t speak French like he’s from Monaco. 

The teenager hands over two cones of fries, and Booker drops a few euros onto the counter. 

Nile watches him. “You didn’t have to pay for me.” 

He doesn’t answer that. He just takes one of the cones and walks across the canal, stopping halfway above the bridge. 

Booker loves Paris with all his heart. It’s the city he returns home to time and time again. It’s where he was born, and he hopes it’s where he’ll eventually die. However, he does think that Amsterdam puts up stiff competition for the title of _the City of Lights_. 

Every bridge is outlined by strings of lights, flanked by lamps older than him. Each boat and buoy blink red or green. The signs that direct cyclists and pedestrians and trams shuffle through their repeating patterns. The row houses are alight with their own twinkling strings of lights. The bars and their neon signs cast the city into a rainbow. And all of it, every single light, reflects off the water in the canals, turning the city into a winding, twisting map of ever-changing rivers of light. 

None of it, not Paris, not Amsterdam, _nothing_ compares to the way Nile reflects the light. She’s a veritable mirrorball, and Booker hasn’t drunk in two decades, but he feels drunk on the sparkle in her eyes. It rivals that of her dress. 

“What are you thinking about?” Nile asks. 

Booker can’t answer that honestly, so instead he asks, “do you remember when you came here in August?” 

Nile seems to consider it for a moment. “I remember the first shots I took in the club, and I remember leaving your flat. That’s about it.” 

Booker tries not to sigh in relief. She doesn’t remember what she said to him, how she propositioned him, her eyes peeking out from under her lashes as she said she wanted someone to _tell her she was bad._ She may not remember it —thank God— but it’s seared into Booker’s brain. 

“Why?” Nile asks after a moment. 

“You told me you were frustrated by the others. By their relationships and their understanding. I felt the same way during my terrible twos.” Booker says. “If you need to get away from it, you don’t have to keep appearing in my flat in the middle of the night. You’re always welcome.” 

Nile bites her lip. “I’m not sure if it’s— I feel like—” She exhales. “A hundred years is a long time, Booker.” 

“It’s not.” 

She sees right through the lie, her eyes meeting his. “It _is._ ” 

“Well,” he says because he can’t think of anything better. “Just text me or something, _ouais?_ So I don’t throw my knife at you.” He pauses. “Do you need a place to stay tonight?” 

“No, I have a hotel.” 

So— why— why was she _in his bed_ last night? Maybe she got lost in her drunkenness, and his flat was close— 

“I’ll walk you there,” he says. 

“You haven’t even finished your fries,” Nile says. She has, and she crumples up the cone and tosses it into a trash can. 

“I’m not that hungry.” He tosses his own fries into the can and wipes his hand on his pants. 

“Well, the night is still young,” Nile’s eyes won’t seem to stop following him. “We should go dancing or something. Get a drink.” 

Booker sighs. “I don’t drink anymore.” Though maybe he should start again if Nile keeps reappearing in his life. 

Nile blinks. “Oh shit. Since when?” 

“About ten minutes after I left Quynh with you all and returned to Paris,” he says. Nile looks like she’s expecting a story. “There’s not much else to say. I went to a bar and ordered some whiskey and thought, why am I doing this?” 

He also thought _this is why they don’t want me to stay._ But he didn’t tell Nile that. 

“I had a few hiccups the first few months,” Booker says. “I went to a few meetings. It’ll be twenty-one years in May.” 

Nile’s quiet for a minute, still watching him. “I’m proud of you, Booker.” 

He doesn’t respond to that. They’ve begun walking once more, and Booker isn’t sure where they’re going but they’re still headed west.

“Can I tell them?” 

He turns at that. “No, no— no.” 

“Why not?” Nile asks. “They’ll be proud of you, too.” 

“Nile,” he starts, then has to pause to rub his hand over his face. “Don’t tell them, please. They’ll think— they’ll think I did it to get back sooner.” 

“Well,” Nile says. “Did you?” 

Yes. No. “You can’t get sober for anyone but yourself,” he says honestly. “But I did think that in time, they would enjoy not having to clean up after my messes.” 

Nile looks at him, then looks down at her hands. “That’s why I’ve been leaving,” she says, her voice so quiet he almost can’t hear it over the noise alerting them to cross the street. “So they don’t have to clean up my messes.” 

“They will, though,” Booker says because it’s important she understands that and doesn’t resent them for it like Booker had. “They will because they’re good and kind and forgiving and understanding people.” 

Nile looks at him. “You’re those things, too.” 

Booker laughs, outright _laughs._ “ _Non,_ no, I am many things, but those— those I am not.” 

Nile stops walking and Booker does too, and she turns to face him slowly, the lamplights reflecting her every movement. _Mirrorball,_ he thinks. 

“If you can’t get sober for anyone but yourself, don’t you have to also be honest with yourself?” Nile asks. 

Yes. No. “You don’t know me, Nile.” 

That was the wrong thing to say. Nile turns away from him and he immediately misses the shimmer in her eyes. 

“My hotel is in the other direction,” she says. 

“Where? I’ll walk you there.” 

“No, thank you,” Nile says, and she turns. “I may not know you, Booker, but I understand you.”

 _You and me, Booker,_ she had said that first night. _We’re fucked up. We’re on the outside._

“Nile—” 

“Goodnight,” she says. “If you follow me, I’ll cut your balls off with the knife holstered on my thigh.” 

He doesn’t say anything and watches as she disappears into the night, taking the light with her.

—

She actually knocks on the door a few nights later, just after midnight. He’s been half-heartedly watching a football match, and even though it’s been twenty-two years, he still finds himself missing Joe’s running commentary in his ear. 

He opens the door, one hand on his Glock, and Nile smiles a weary smile, then vomits all over his shoes. 

“Fuck,” he says, looking down at the vomit, then up at Nile, who doesn’t look— 

He catches her when she collapses forward. “Fuck, Nile,” he says, and he pulls her into his arms and gets the door closed behind her. “What’s wrong?” 

“Bad trip,” she slurs, her eyes closing. 

“Nile, _mon amie,_ ” he says and tries to ignore the panic in his voice. “Please stay awake.” 

Her eyes flutter open, then shut again. “Gonna puke,” she says, and her voice is so soft. “‘gain.” 

“Okay,” he says. He guides her to the bathroom, trying not to wince when she stumbles over herself. Her feet are bare, and her dress is ripped, and her makeup is running. Who left her like this? He wants to kill that person slowly, with a garrote. “It’s okay, Nile.” 

He holds her hair back while she retches into his toilet. When it seems like the vomiting has paused, he goes into the kitchen and brings back a glass of water. “Here, Nile, drink this,” he says, handing the glass to her. “Slowly, just sip it, okay?” 

Nile looks up at him as she takes a small sip. “See?” 

“What?” 

“I told you the other night,” she says, resting her head against the toilet seat. “You are those things.” 

His heart clenches. He wants to protest but instead he says, “Nile, you can’t sleep on the toilet.” 

“Sure can,” she murmurs. 

“What did you take?” 

“Thought it was E,” she says. “Might’ve been laced with something.” 

“You don’t know?” 

Nile cracks one eye open. “Chris gave ‘em to me.” 

He tries to place the name. “The asshole American?” The garrote is too kind. He’ll need his thumbscrews. 

“Hey,” she protests weakly. “I’m American.” 

“Nile—” he starts. “How do you even know them?” 

“Met them at the hostel.” 

She’s staying at a _hostel?_ “Nile—” 

“I don’t need a lecture,” Nile says. “It was just supposed to be fun.” 

He doesn’t want to lecture her because she’s a grown fucking woman who can make her own decisions. But he also wants to take her face in his hands and ask her what the fuck she was thinking. And then kiss her, but he pushes that thought away.

Instead he helps her drink the last of the water and gives her a soft washcloth to wipe her face. When he guides her into the bedroom, he averts his eyes as she pulls off her dress, and he places another glass of water by her bedside.

“Sleep, Nile,” he says as he turns off the lamp on the bedside table, but she’s already asleep. 

He tries to return to watching the match. After a minute, he turns off the television and grabs his jacket. He makes sure the door is locked and that there’s a gun and ammo by Nile’s bedside before he leaves to go on a walk to clear his head.

—

By the time he returns to his flat it’s 7:30 p.m. Booker walked to Haarlem, meant to turn around, and then walked through Zuid-Kennemerland national park and ended up in Bloemendaal aan Zee, where he watched the sunrise on the coast. He ate breakfast and began walking back. 

He got back into the city around 2 p.m., and couldn’t go back to the apartment, couldn’t see if Nile stayed or left, so he went to his gym and ran on the treadmill like he hadn't just walked over 50 kilometers to get a woman out of his head. He still hadn’t exhausted himself, so he swam laps until his fingers pruned and his muscles cramped. 

He showered and thanked anyone above that he keeps a spare change of clothes in his locker. Then, he went grocery shopping because he needed to, and bought himself a sandwich at the deli counter and ate it. Then it was 7:30 p.m., and he ran out of excuses for not going back to his flat.

He unlocks the door and nearly runs into Nile. 

“Oh,” she says, barely looking up from her phone. “You’re back.” 

Booker can’t believe he ever had the audacity to compare her to the moon. Now, in shimmering gold bell-bottoms with slits that keep climbing up the expanse of her leg, and a matching top cropped at her navel and a gold ribbon woven throughout her hair, she looks like the sun. No, she looks _brighter—_ like the center of the universe. 

He really shouldn’t have taken that astronomy course in 2005. 

He swallows, and his brain comes back online, and he realizes that she’s dressed to go out _again._

“You’re going out?” He asks. He doesn’t miss the way his voice sounds strangled. 

“Yeah, Chris and them found a cool club along the waterfront.” 

“... This is the boy who gave you ecstasy last night?” Booker asks, but it’s not a question. “The one you thought was laced with something? That had you vomiting across my doorstep?” 

“Not his fault,” Nile says, her eyes narrowing. “He’s studying abroad; it’s not like he knows the dealers around here.” 

“And you do?” Booker shoots back. “What drugs are you picking up tonight?” 

“I’m a grown fucking woman, Booker,” Nile shoots back just as quick. “I can make my own decisions.” 

“There’s a difference between making your own decisions and being blatantly reckless,” he says, as he sets the tote of groceries and his keys on the console next to the door and runs a hand through his hair. 

She stares up at him. They’re still so close to the door, and Nile takes one step forward and Booker’s pinned. “I said, I’m a grown fucking woman,” she says, her eyes flashing. 

“I didn’t know a grown fucking woman could be so stupid,” he retorts, and then in a blink of an eye, a knife is at his throat. 

“What the fuck did you say to me?” Nile says, her voice low and deadly. “They told me about your second decade, you son of a bitch. You drank yourself sick and fucked your way through every whorehouse in Western Europe.” 

“So what,” Booker says. “It’s perfectly reasonable to let you go out with the very children who drugged you last night? Do you have no sense of self-preservation?” 

“Who needs fucking self-preservation when _I can’t die_?” Nile says, and she presses the blade further into Booker’s skin. “I’m going out. I’m going to drink myself sick. I’m gonna take whatever the fuck I want to take, and _you can’t stop me._ And then,” she continues, and smiles, a sneering smile that he’s never seen on her before. “And then I’ll come back here, to your sad little flat, and you’ll take care of me while you worry about your fucking _bad touch_ and being a dirty old man.” 

She pulls the knife away and tries to push past him, and Booker turns and pins her to the door, her wrist in his. 

_You and me, Booker_ , she said. _We’re on the outside._

“What was that you said that night in August?” He says, his eyes trained on hers. “You said you wanted someone to tell you that you were bad?” 

She grins, wolf-like, and he knows that she was lying that night when she said she didn’t remember. “Are you going to tell me, Booker?” Nile asks. “Or are you going to keep wallowing in your own self-pity?” 

He doesn’t say anything. He squeezes her wrist tightly until she drops the knife and gasps. He feels drunk on that gasp alone. “I am a dirty old man,” Booker says. “But maybe you like that, hm?” 

Nile’s smile grows from wolf to lioness stalking her prey. “And I thought you were the brains of this outfit?” 

Motherfucking _Jesus_ cocksucking _Christ_.

He’s kissing that smile off her face before he can even think about it, and she’s kissing back. It’s not gentle— she takes his lower lip into her teeth and _bites,_ and Booker thinks that he’s going to die, right then and there. 

Good thing it won’t take. 

He lets go of her wrists in favor of grabbing her ass, and Nile doesn’t hesitate as she wraps her legs around his waist. He presses her back against the door and she rocks underneath him, making him groan. She smiles against his lip and rocks again, and the groan turns into a growl. 

“You’re going to be the death of me,” he says as he kisses below her ear, right on her pulse. She whines when he tests his teeth against her skin, and he nips before soothing the bite with a swipe of his tongue. He feels like a teenager, kissing Marie-Claudette Fournier behind her father’s boulangerie. This feels indescribable compared to that. 

“Good thing it won’t take,” Nile says. Her arms are thrown around his neck, and she laces a finger through his shaggy hair and _pulls,_ and the noise he makes is— unbecoming. He doesn’t care. 

“Do you still want to go out?” He asks, running his nose along her jawline until he pulls away infinitesimally and meets her eyes. 

“Yes,” she says, and he growls, a low grumble, pushing her against the door, tightening his grip on her ass. 

“Don’t lie to me, Nile,” he says. “ _Do you want to go out?”_

“No,” she says, and God, the way her eyes are alight puts the invention of electricity to shame. “But there is a bed about a hundred feet behind you.” 

He’s going to have to have a conversation with her about the metric system, but not until after he’s buried his head between her thighs for at least an hour.

Booker doesn’t let go of her as he stumbles through the flat, though Nile does untangle her hands from his hair to remove her top. She’s not wearing a bra, and Booker stumbles again as he takes in the sight, knocking into a table and sending a lamp crashing to the ground. 

She laughs and keeps laughing as he throws her onto his bed, and it sounds like Paris at noon on a Sunday, when the bells from every steeple ring out across the city, calling their parishioners home. 

He’s called to her in the same way now, and he tugs off the shimmering gold pants. _Christ,_ she’s not wearing any underwear, either. 

“Every night you showed up in my flat, were you just as scantily clad?” He asks, flinging the pants towards the door. 

“Ye— _oh—_ ” She doesn’t finish the thought because Booker has come home, has buried his face between her legs, and he isn’t planning to stop anytime soon. “Booker, _fuck,_ ” she gasps as he licks broad, flat strokes across her clit. He sucks at it gently, and she bucks against his face, smearing her wetness across his nose. Why do they fight? Why does he ever aim a gun or get shot when he could feel her slick against his face instead of blood?

He swears softly and presses his arm against her lower stomach. 

“You can’t stay still, can you?” Booker asks. Nile groans from above him. “What do you want?” 

“Don’t be nice,” Nile says. “We can fuck nicely tomorrow. I just— I need you _now_.” 

Booker’s brain short circuits and he pushes her over, rolling her onto her stomach. He drags his tongue along the length of her spine, smiling as she arches up into the sensation, and he drags his nose along the part of her ass, getting a hand on each cheek and spreading her apart. 

He looks his fill now and revels in the cocky smile Nile throws back at him over her shoulder. “Like what you see?” She asks. It’s not a question, and he’s drunk on her confidence. 

“It’s indescribable,” he says honestly, and he’s shocked by how hoarse his voice is. Nile opens her mouth to say something, but whatever she was going to say is lost in a moan as Booker presses his tongue to the pucker of her asshole.

“Oh my fucking God, Book,” Nile gasps. “You _are_ a dirty old man.” 

He grins against her ass and slides a finger into her pussy, so wet and warm and relaxed that he slides another in without second thought. “Has anyone done this for you?” He asks. “Licked you here?” 

Nile lets out something strangled between a _no_ and another moan, and Booker grins. “ _Good._ ” 

He dives back in, licking and sucking and fucking her with his tongue and fingers, as Nile gasps and bucks and writhes beneath him. Her hand winds her way down to his hair, twisting it in her fist and pulling him closer. 

He abandons fucking her with his fingers to swipe at her clit as he presses his tongue further into her hole, and she comes with a shout, shivering and panting. He keeps fucking her with his tongue as she rides her orgasm until she’s pulling at his hair and rolling over. 

“C’mere, c’mere, fuck, _Booker_ ,” She says, as she pulls him into a kiss, her tongue swiping over his, tasting herself and _devouring_ him. 

She pushes herself upwards, her arms gripping his biceps, and he goes willingly as she pushes him against the headboard, sitting upright. The moon has risen outside his window, full and bright, bathing the bedroom in a pale glow. She looks like an angel above him, a heavenly body with eyes that sparkle like the Eiffel Tower at night. 

Then she grins that lioness grin. She rips open his shirt, buttons flying everywhere, and she doesn’t bother to take off his pants, just unzips them and pulls his cock out. “No underwear?” She asks. “Tell me, every night I climbed into your bed, were you just as scantily clad?” 

Booker doesn’t get a chance to answer because she swings a leg over his lap, straddling him and she sinks down on his cock in one fluid motion. 

“ _Fuck,_ ” she groans. “God, Booker, you’re so _big.”_

He tries to swallow his groan. “You’re too kind,” he says. 

Nile’s eyes narrow. “It’s not just your big cock,” she says, as she begins to rock back and forth, grinding her clit against the wiry hair covering his pelvis. “It’s your thighs and your biceps that are the size of my head.” She snakes a hand around his throat. “And your neck, fuck, it’s so _thick_.” She tests her nails against his neck, squeezing lightly around his throat, and he’s been trying to stay still but he can’t any longer; he’s going to die if he doesn’t move, and he fucks up into her. 

They both groan at that, and then Nile begins riding him in earnest. He doesn’t know where to look— the soft, smooth skin of her belly undulating, or the way the muscles in her thighs flex as she fucks herself on his cock, or the way her braids are coming loose and falling into her eyes. Or— fuck— her _tits._

He pushes himself forward, winding his hands into her hair. The loose bun comes undone, and he pulls the gold ribbon from where it was woven between braids. Nile pulls her hands away from his neck and takes the ribbon from him. She ties it around his wrist, the wiry ribbon biting as she pulls it taught and tight, knotting it efficiently. 

She looks up at him through half-lidded eyes and brings her hands back to his neck. “You’re _mine,_ ” she says, and Booker makes a sound like he’s dying and captures her lower lip between his teeth before burying her face in her breasts, biting and sucking at her nipples, fondling her like a teenager. 

“Your hand,” Nile gasps, “I need your hand, Book—” 

She doesn’t even finish before he swipes his thumb over her clit once, twice, and she comes again, shuddering. She bites his shoulder and tightens her hand around his neck, and he bucks up into her and comes, pulsing into her tight, wet heat. 

Nile rests her forehead against his, her mouth against his, just breathing the same air as they pant and ride out their orgasms together. 

“ _Merde,_ Nile,” he says, still out of breath. “ _Tu seras ma mort_.” 

“ _N'est-ce pas comme ça que tu l'appelles_?” She says. “ _La petite mort?”_

He laughs, though he still feels breathless and wild so it comes out like a huff. “Nicky _tu-a-t-il appris cela_?”

“ _Ne parle pas de_ Nicky _avec ta bite en moi_ ,” Nile says as she wrinkles her nose. “ _S'il te plaît._ ” 

“ _Mes excuses.”_

 _“Excuses acceptées, ma petite poubelle,”_ Nile says, and kisses away Booker’s soft ‘hey!’ 

She pulls off him then, his softening cock slipping out of her, and she lays back on the bed. She looks well-satiated, like a lioness after a feast, but her eyes are softer— worrying. 

“Nile,” he says softly. He kicks off his pants and wraps her in his shirt, and pulls her close to him. After a second, he grabs the soft blanket he knitted from the end of the bed and throws it over their bodies. “What’s wrong? Do you—” 

“Don’t finish that thought, Book,” she says. “I don’t regret anything. It’s just—” He waits, and she tucks his head under her chin. Against his hair, she says, “I’m still so fucked up.” 

“Nile—” 

“No, just—” She takes a deep breath. “I left the Guard because I kept getting myself killed. Joe called it reckless endangerment. I yelled at him and Nicky; I said they were babying me, that they needed to let me do my job. Nicky said I couldn’t do my job if I was constantly healing. Andy was less polite. She said I was wasting their time, taking so long to heal from bigger injuries. She said I reminded her of you, and if I was so fucking miserable, I should be with you.” 

Booker is quiet for a moment. Against her neck, he says, “it’s true. I’m familiar with the urge to recklessly endanger myself.” 

“And I’m so fucking lonely. But everyone— everyone either expected me to continue taking immortality in stride, because I did so well my first year, or they watched me like they were expecting me to break down at any moment and shatter into a million pieces.” Nile pauses. “I couldn’t— I couldn’t just be— somewhere in the middle. It was like they wanted me to be strong and self-sufficient or help me through my crises. And I couldn’t do either, so I left last year.” 

“You shouldn’t feel guilty about that,” he says. “We aren’t with each other all the time. In the past, we’ve split up for years at a time to travel alone.” 

“Yeah, but now, with Andy— she and Quynh are clinging together so tightly, and Joe and Nicky want to spend as much time with them as possible and—” 

_You and me, Booker_ , she had said. _We’re on the outside._

“You can take time away from them,” he says. “I meant what I said the other night. You’re always welcome.” 

Nile hums. “See—” she takes another deep breath. “I know you’re gonna be a big thing, Book. You’re gonna be a big part of my life. I can tell. I don’t know if it’ll be, like, Nicky and Joe, never apart soulmates, but I know you’ll be important to me.” 

Her hands come under his chin and she gently tilts his head so he’s looking into her eyes. “But I don’t think I’m ready for that yet. I still have to—” She smiles a soft, wry smile. “Grow up.” 

He returns her smile, though his may be a little sadder. “I understand, Nile. I do. I still have some growing up to do, too, eh?” He presses a kiss to her jaw, then the corner of her mouth. “You take all the time you need. I still have 60 years left in exile.” 

“No, you don’t,” Nile says, and he looks at her with surprise. “Andy and Nicky miss you. Joe does, too, even if he doesn’t say it. We watch soccer together, and he’s always turning to his right to say something to you and frowning when he remembers you’re not there. We’ll ask you to come back, sooner rather than later. We’re not meant to be alone.” 

He tries to ignore the thudding in his heart when she says that and tries to ignore the feeling of homesickness that hasn’t eased in two decades. 

“Don’t worry,” he says, surprising himself with how steady his voice sounds. “It’s you and me, eh? We can take our time. We’ve got plenty of it. I can be patient.” 

She smiles then, and he smiles back and presses a soft kiss to her lips. “You still have to fuck me nicely tomorrow,” Nile says against his lips. 

“Did I say I was patient?” He says as he pulls himself on top of her. “I was lying. Why leave for tomorrow what we can do now?” 

She laughs, and her eyes shine like they’re shining just for him. _Mirrorball,_ he thinks, and he kisses her again. 

**Author's Note:**

> Me: Booker probably thinks he's a dirty old man for being into Nile. Maybe Nile's into that. 
> 
> Also me: would your second decade of immortality be after ten years or twenty years? 
> 
> Also me: wrote this fic because I went to Amsterdam for a week by myself in January 2020 before everything went to hell and I was craving frites. 
> 
> Thank you SO much to the incredible [Isa](www.yogurtfordinner.tumblr.com) for her excellent beta. The title comes from Mirrorball by Taylor Swift which is.... VERY Nile/Booker, at least for this fic. If you comment/kudos/ANYTHING I will love you forever and promise to respond to each and every one!
> 
> I took six years of French, three at the collegiate level, and still had to use google translate for this fic:  
> Qui t’enseigne le français? - Who is teaching you French?  
> Mais il parle avec un accent. - But he speaks with an accent.  
> Le locuteur natif n’est pas là. - The native speaker isn't there.  
> Merde. Tu seras ma mort - Shit, you'll be my death  
> N'est-ce pas comme ça que tu l'appelles? La petite mort? - Isn't that what you call it? The little death?  
> Nicky tu-a-t-il appris cela? - Nicky teach you that?  
> Ne parle pas de Nicky avec ta bite en moi. S'il te plaît. - Don't talk about Nicky with your dick in me. Please.  
> Mes excuses. - My apologies.  
> Excuses acceptées, ma petite poubelle. - Apologies accepted, my little trashcan (a french term of endearment.)
> 
> The one dutch bit is "two, with mayonnaise, please."


End file.
